DUBAI: Dubai International (DXB) retained its position as the world’s number one airport for international passengers for the fourth consecutive year with annual traffic for 2017 reaching 88.2 million passengers, according to the annual traffic report issued by operator Dubai Airports.
According to Khaleej Times, DXB welcomed six new scheduled passenger airlines during the year, including SalamAir, Badr Airlines, and Air Moldova, while home-based carriers Emirates and flydubai added 3 and 10 new passenger destinations and increased frequency/capacity on 31 and 22 routes respectively.
India continued its domination run as the single largest destination country for DXB with 12,060,435 passengers in 2017, up 5.4% compared to 11,440,215 passengers recorded in 2016. The UK claimed the second spot with 6,466,404 passengers (+6.7 per cent), overtaking Saudi Arabia which recorded 6,364,598 passengers (4.6 per cent).
Markets showing the most significant growth during the year included Russia with passenger numbers surging 28 per cent to 1,339,534 and China with 2,212,179 passengers, up 19.4 per cent over 2016. The surge follows the relaxation of visa regulations by the UAE to offer visa on arrival for both Russian and Chinese visitors. Thailand, bolstered by additional capacity deployed by Emirates through a switch to two-class A380 service, also registered robust growth of 15.2 per cent with passenger numbers reaching 2,445,053 in 2017.
London retained its position as the top destination city with 4,011,598 passengers, followed by Mumbai with 2,477,771 passengers and Jeddah with 2,113,820 passengers.
Top regions in terms of percentage growth in 2017 were South America (36.1 per cent), Eastern Europe (25.3 per cent) and Asia (17.9 per cent) – mainly spurred by network expansion by Emirates, flydubai and other carriers.
The average number of passenger per flight grew 6.9 per cent to 223 during the year compared to 209 for 2016, mainly due to DXB’s position as the world’s largest hub for wide body aircraft, particularly for the A380.
The number of flight movements during 2017 totalled 409,493, down 2.4 per cent compared to 419,654 recorded in 2016. December’s flight numbers totalled 35,132 compared to 36,065 in the corresponding month in 2016, down 2.6 per cent.
DXB witnessed some fluctuation in cargo volumes during the year but thanks to the bumper growth in March (8.4 per cent), August (11.8 per cent*) and September (5.8 per cent), 2017 freight volumes reached a record 2,654,494 tonnes, up 2.4 per cent compared to 2,592,454 recorded during 2016. In December DXB handled 229,019 tonnes of cargo compared to 230,122 tonnes recorded in the same month during 2016, a minor contraction of 0.5 per cent.
Paul Griffiths, CEO of Dubai Airports, said, “It was a very successful year for DXB as we not only achieved robust growth in traffic to solidify our position as the world’s number one international airport but also delighted our customers with a range of new and exciting services and innovative products.”
